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Grim Reaper Busy Again In 2005 After Off Year In '04

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The Associated Press

Published: September 13, 2007

ATLANTA - The number of deaths in the United States rose in 2005 after a sharp decline the year earlier, a disappointing reversal that suggests the 2004 numbers were a fluke. Cancer deaths were also up.

U.S. health officials said they think the drop in deaths in 2004 may have been because of an unusually mild flu season. Deaths from flu and lower respiratory disease jumped in 2005.

The new mortality data were released Wednesday in a report by the National Center for Health Statistics. It was a preliminary report based on about 99 percent of the death records reported in all 50 states and the District of Columbia for 2005.

Last year, statistics from 2004 showed that U.S. deaths fell to 2,397,615. It was a decline of about 50,000 from 2003 and the largest drop in deaths in nearly 70 years. Some experts saw it as a sign of the triumph of modern medicine.

The preliminary 2005 death count was up more than 50,000 - about 2,447,900 - almost back to the 2003 level.

'The best way to look at this is in five-year groupings, because every once in a while you are going to have an aberration,' said Ken Thorpe, an Emory University health policy professor.

The unusually mild flu season in 2004 cut the influenza death rate - deaths per 100,000 population - by 7 percent. It also likely had a ripple effect by not worsening the condition of frail patients who ultimately died of something else, government health scientists said.

Heart disease and stroke - the No. 1 and No. 3 killers - killed fewer people in 2005 than in 2004, but the No. 2 cause of death, cancer, rose to about 559,000 from 554,000, according to the report.

The death rates for heart disease, stroke and cancer all declined.

The death rate was 210 per 100,000 for heart disease, 184 for cancer, and 46.5. for stroke.

The success against heart disease is at least partly because of better treatments, which overcame the impact of an aging, growing population, Thorpe said.

With total cancer deaths, there was no such offset in 2005. 'That's unfortunate news,' he said.

U.S. life expectancy inched up to 77.9 from the previous record, 77.8, recorded for 2004.

The increase was more dramatic in contrast with 1995, when life expectancy was 75.8, and 1955, when it was 69.6.

Life expectancy for whites in 2005 was 78.3, the same as in 2004. Black life expectancy rose from 73.1 in 2004 to 73.2 in 2005, but it was still nearly five years lower than the white figure.

Also, there were 5 percent increases in the rates for Alzheimer's disease, the No. 7 leading cause of death, and for Parkinson's, which was No. 14.

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